Originally posted: October 2015
Heather Nicol is a Professor in the Department of Geography at Trent University in Peterborough, Ontario where her teaching and research focuses on geopolitics in the North American Arctic region. Nicol is a member of University of the Arctic’s thematic network, Geopolitics and Security.
Her most recent publications include “Nunavut, Sovereignty, and the Future for Arctic Peoples’ Involvement in Regional Self-Determination,” published in The Northern Review (2013) and The Fence and The Bridge: Geopolitics and Perception Along the Canada U.S. Border(forthcoming, 2015).
Nicol’s research explores the structural dynamics that orient the political geography of the circumpolar North, with a special focus on the North American Arctic and Canada-U.S. relations. Her work examines regional cooperation and tensions, geopolitical narratives, and mappings of power and sovereignty. She is currently exploring both the history of circumpolar geopolitics in relation to globalization and post-global world paradigms and the related issue of the dynamic of the North American chairmanship of the Arctic Council which began in Kiruna Sweden 2013, when Canada assumed the Chair, continuing to 2017, when the American Chairmanship concludes.
As UW’s Canada Fulbright Visiting Chair in Arctic Studies to the University of Washington in 2015-16, Nicol plans to explore the U.S. Arctic Chairmanship and the geopolitics of its “One Arctic” approach, looking with referee to broader patterns of American, Canadian and circumpolar geopolitics.
Nicol will be in residence at the UW in Fall Quarter 2015 and Spring Quarter 2016. In Spring Quarter 2016, Nicol will teach ARCTIC 401: Canada & U.S. Chairmanship of the Arctic Council, 2013-17. If you wish to contact Heather, you can reach her at heathernicol@trentu.ca.
The Canada Fulbright Visiting Chair in Arctic Studies is supported by the UW Office of Global Affairs, the Henry M. Jackson School of International Studies, Social Sciences Division, College of Arts and Sciences, College of the Environment, and the Foundation for Educational Exchange Between Canada and the United States of America, Ottawa. The Canadian Studies Center, Henry M. Jackson School of International Studies, serves as the hosting unit for the Canada Fulbright Chair.